Procrastinating, Kingdom Saving, and all other forms of Geekdom

People Look At Me And See My Brother

I know I’m a day late on this Daily Prompt, but I actually started writing it yesterday. I just didn’t finish it until today. Does that still count? I don’t know, but even if it doesn’t, I’m ok with it. Also, I know this quote isn’t from what I have said is my favorite movie, but the only quote from The Dark Knight that jumps out at you is, “Why so serious,” and since I’m usually only serious when I have to be, that quote doesn’t really apply to me. Since this quote covers an ongoing theme in my life, I went with it (10 points if you know what movie this is from without looking it up).

As some of you may be aware, Twindaddy and I are only a year apart in age. Therefore, whenever I started a new grade in school growing up, I almost always had the same teacher he had the year before. The first time this happened was second grade. On the first day of school, the teacher was calling everyone’s name and waiting for a response. She stopped when she got to my name. After I responded that I was present, she looked me over and asked me if I was Twindaddy’s brother. I told her that I was and from that moment on, I ceased being “Revis Edgewater” and became “Twindaddy’s brother.”

As we got closer to, and into, high school, this dropped off a bit, but only because we moved around and we didn’t always have the same teachers. During this time, however, it moved from inside of school to outside of school. This is when I started being the third wheel. There were some people who were friends to both of us, but there were also some that were just his friends. I’m pretty sure that one of his friends in high school, and maybe more, hated me, but let me hang out with them from time to time because I am “Twindaddy’s brother”.

After high school we both had our seperate lives. I was finally “Revis Edgewater” again. Then, my mother, my younger brother, and I, moved up to Detroit to be closer to her family. Twindaddy also came, of course, bringing along the woman who would end up becoming the twins’ mother and her other two children. This is when I went back to being “Twindaddy’s brother”.

When we moved to Detroit, the only job I could find was at a Burger King right up the street from us. Since working fast food was not the job that I really wanted, I set out to try to find a new one. Twindaddy was able to help me with that. He got me a job working for Wal-Mart. He was already working there, but, since he was in a position of authority, I couldn’t work at that particular store. I had to work at a different one. You wouldn’t think that I would be able to go from being “Revis Edgewater” to “Twindaddy’s brother” when we didn’t work in the same store, but I was able to do it.

The lady who hired me was the wife of Twindaddy’s boss. The lady, who I’ll call Camel Toe (I’m pretty sure I don’t need to explain why I’m calling her that), would see my brother at least a few times a week when she went to see her husband. That meant that every time she saw him, I’d have to hear about what he said and did while she was there. Oy vey.

We lived in Detroit for around a year before we moved back to Northern Kentucky. I transferred to the local Wal-Mart store where, this time, me and Twindaddy were allowed to work together. In fact, at one point in time, both of my brothers, my mother, and I all worked at the same Wal-Mart. During this time, I was called either of my brother’s names as much, if not more, than my own. It got to the point to where I would answer to any of the three names. Over the years, we all stopped working for Wal-Mart, for various reasons, and I went back to being “Revis Edgewater”.

Skip forward to present day and, thanks to WordPress, I’m back to being “Twindaddy’s brother” again. Every day you people come here to read his latest posts, or talk to him through the comments (as well you should. He is an amazing writer and an even better person.) I come here and it’s like I’m back in high school: my brother is hanging out with his friends and I’m only allowed to play because I’m “Twindaddy’s brother”. Let’s face facts here, folks, if I was to never post here again, most of you would never notice. If he was to never post here again, there’d be riots in the streets.

I know that most of this is my fault. I don’t get out into the WordPress community as much as he does. It’s not that I don’t want to, it’s just that I don’t have the opportunity or time to. My brother can post and comment from his phone. I can’t. The only thing I can do on my phone is read posts. If I do want to like or comment on the posts I read, I have to wait until I get home to do it, and by then, I’ve usually forgotten that I wanted to like or comment on your posts. Plus, by the time I get home from work, I want to spend time with my beautiful wife and my beautiful daughter.

I also know that this post probably makes it look like I’m jealous of all the attention my brother receives. This is not the case. My brother deserves all of the love and praise that everybody heaps on him. When I was younger, I probably would be jealous of him about this, but my perspective not nearly the same as it was then. It changed during our time at Wal-Mart together. That’s when I had the accident that is the cause of my back pain. I was almost crushed to death by a forklift. As you can imagine, a near-death experience is good for changing your outlook on life.

It taught me to stop worrying about inconsequential things: things like how many people read my blog posts. Do I want people to read what I write? Sure. Do I want them to like what I write? Of course. Does it bother me if they don’t? Nope. There are far more important things that can occupy my mind.

So, over the course of my life, I’ve gone back and forth from being “Revis Edgewater” to “Twindaddy’s brother”. I guess you could say I’m both now. I love my brother, I always have, but it used to piss me off to be “Twindaddy’s brother”. Now, I’m proud to be “Twindaddy’s brother”.

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40 comments on “People Look At Me And See My Brother”

Revis, we love you too. But you’re right that so much of blogging is commenting back and forth. And I can’t keep up with all the Stuph posts.

I sure do know how you feel, being someone’s sibling. I’m the youngest of 5. My parents would go through the names of the other 4 before getting to mine. In a fit of peak one night I hollered to (never at!) my father : “Why don’t you just call me NUMBER 5?” It became a form of endearment for the rest of his life.

Oh, and I never read anything about zombies. It hits too close to home.

Our younger brother said they used to call him my name when we worked at Walmart together, but it only bothered him because we don’t really look anything alike. He is, after all, a half a foot taller than I am.

Completely understand you. A lot. Everyone knows my brother and sister, ok not you guys, but other peoples that I know that are bloggers, and I’ve always been their sister. I am me, who happens to be a lot quieter than the other 2, in my own world, and quite happy there. Sorry you didn’t know I was someone.
Welcome to my club Revis, let’s go take over the world!

When my sister and I were in school, we used to freak our teachers out on the day after parent teacher conferences. They’d do the I met your parents yesterday…you never told me you have a sister. We would reply totally deadpan, “that’s because I don’t”. The reactions were priceless.